I haven’t been quiet about my ambivalence toward John Carter, Andrew Stanton‘s live-action directing debut, but I think I’ve finally figured out what my problem with the film is: the dialogue. Or at least, that’s what I’ve come to suspect after watching this new 60-second TV spot. The new video downplays the talking bits and highlights the action, and perhaps as a result, it may be my favorite teaser / trailer / commercial for John Carter yet. Watch it after the jump.

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One film I’ve been decidedly mixed on is John Carter, Andrew Stanton‘s live-action debut. Much as I love the talent involved — stars Taylor Kitsch, Willem Dafoe, Mark Strong, etc., screenwriter Michael Chabon, and of course Stanton — I haven’t loved the footage we’ve seen of it so far. But trailers, clips, and Super Bowl spots only tell us so much, and some of the buzz from the early screenings have made the project sound a bit more promising. Hit the jump for more.

Super Bowl Sunday is one of America’s biggest non-denominational holidays. Whether you follow the NFL every single Sunday or hardly know which teams are participating, odds are at some point you’ll be sucked into the hype. Maybe it’s for the commercials or maybe it’s because there’s a party going but either way, Sunday’s game is hard to avoid.

As film fans, Super Bowl XLVI has a few cool, minor threads. For example Rooney Mara, star of The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, is the niece of the owner of the New York Giants. So just imagine an actress who is Oscar-nominated for playing an anti-social hero jumping up and down based on the play of Eli Manning. Kind of hard to picture.

Another thing is that Andrew Stanton, a native of Rockport, Massachusetts, will reportedly screen his latest film, John Carter, for not only his hometown team, the New England Patriots, but the Giants as well. Read more about it after the jump and check out a new featurette with never-bef0re-seen footage. Read More »

If the name Kerry Conran doesn’t sound familiar, that’s because he’s only made one movie: Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow. For a directorial debut, though, talk about a massive undertaking. The film is still largely considered a failure but its innovative use of green screen and digital effects foreshadowed what would become the standard in filmmaking in the years that followed.

One of those films is the upcoming John Carter, Andrew Stanton’s hugely expensive and highly anticipated adaptation of the work of Edgar Rice Burroughs. Before Stanton took the helm, though, John Carter of Mars was a property many, many producers and directors tried to tackle. We’ve all heard about Jon Favreau and Robert Rodriguez but one name we forget was Conran, a natural choice thanks to his digital work, who was attached to the film around the time of Sky Captain.

His attachment was probably in large part to an extensive demo reel used pitch his vision. And wouldn’t you know it? It’s online. Watch it after the jump. Read More »

The first teaser for Disney’s John Carter, and the trailer that followed, skipped over most of the details of how Civil War soldier John Carter (Taylor Kitsch) is transported to Mars. You see glimpses of his existence on Earth, but for those who don’t know the story on which the movie is based, the real details are still a mystery.

A new Japanese trailer shows a bit more of the framing story, and of the moments in which John Carter is actually transported to Mars. There are a few other new moments in this trailer, making it worth a look for those who still have high hopes for Andrew Stanton‘s adaptation of the Edgar Rice Burroughs novel A Princess of Mars. Read More »

Walt Disney Pictures has announced the upcoming publication of The Art of John Carter: A Visual Journey (preorder on Amazon). Disney Editions has released a series of concept art illustrations from the book hidden within a web game, which give us a more expansive look at Andrew Stanton‘s version of Mars.

Yup, that’s Michael Giacchino striking the goofy pose in the header image, but don’t let the silliness fool you — he’s one of the hottest film and TV composers working today, and one of the main reasons you should be excited about the rest of this post. After the jump:

Listen to ten minutes of Michael Giacchino’s score for John Carter

Quentin Tarantino’s Django Unchained could be getting an unusual take on Frank Sinatra’s “My Way”

I think we can all agree that, whether or not you belive Andrew Stanton‘s 3D mega-budget fantasy John Carter is going to deliver, the second trailer was a vast improvement over the teaser. Finally we got a glimpse at the massive scope we can expect from the Oscar-winning director on March 9.

Piggybacking off that, and a few new posters, two new TV spots have come on line that include some new battle/actions scenes. And, dare I say, they improve on what we saw in the last trailer. Check them out below. Read More »